


Escape

by AirgiodSLV



Series: 28 Lotrips AUs Challenge [9]
Category: The Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-04-19
Updated: 2006-04-19
Packaged: 2019-07-20 12:14:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16137029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AirgiodSLV/pseuds/AirgiodSLV
Summary: Dom shrugged agreement, glancing around in spite of himself – notlookingfor anyone, just lookingaround- and straightened up when he saw a young man in a lab coat walking down the hallway towards him. “Mr. –” he began, and then stopped once the man got close enough to recognize. “You!”





	Escape

**Author's Note:**

> AU #8, for [](https://alchemilla.livejournal.com/profile)[alchemilla](https://alchemilla.livejournal.com/). The long-promised but never-written sequel to [Introduction](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16136393).

For the second time in two weeks, Dom found himself walking through the glass doors of CyberTech, package in hand. This time he was a little less lost, a little less overwhelmed, but the sheer amount of shiny chrome and faux-marble still made him uncomfortable touching…anything.

It was back to the B wing, and this time there was a friendly-looking woman behind the desk, wearing too much makeup and a frilly blouse covered in what looked like hundreds of little eyes. Dom averted his gaze from the fashion horror and offered up his package.

“Delivery for Mr. Wood, B23,” Dom announced, and the woman blinked at him and read the package label carefully through the thick glasses hanging around her neck before shaking her head.

“We don’t have anyone here by that name, I’m sorry. It does say CyberTech, though, and we have a lot of people doing short-term work…maybe they just gave the wrong address. Or it could be that young man of Miss Tyler’s, I never remember his name. Just hang out here for a minute, won’t you, sweetie?”

Dom shrugged agreement, glancing around in spite of himself – not _looking_ for anyone, just looking _around_ \- and straightened up when he saw a young man in a lab coat walking down the hallway towards him. “Mr. –” he began, and then stopped once the man got close enough to recognize. “You!”

Elijah grinned at him, fingers wiggling in a choreographed teasing gesture. “Me. Is that my package?”

“No,” Dominic said immediately. “This is for a Mr. Wood. They let you wear a lab coat?”

“Not usually,” Elijah replied offhandedly. “But they do indulge my whims now and then as long as it doesn’t upset their precious experiments, and it does make today easier, you have to admit. I’ve been very good for ten days just to get you back here.”

“You…” Dom began in confusion. “What do you mean, you got me back here? Is there really no Mr. Wood? You ordered a package under a false name?” His emotions were a bit jumbled, and as a result his tone ended up somewhere between dismayed – what was he going to tell his superiors about this delivery? – and pleased – Elijah had done all of this to get him back! Him! – with distinct overtones of bemusement.

“No,” Elijah answered, taking the package out of his hands while Dom was still blinking over that bit of information. “The package is for me. W-00-D, it’s my serial number. Package delivered, do you need a signature?” He signed fluidly on the line on Dom’s clipboard, and handed it back to him with a smile. “Now get out of here, and wait for me down by the main doors. Oh, and one more thing…”

His fingers tripped the pink plastic ID card from Dom’s lanyard, tucking it into the pocket of his lab coat. “Perfect,” he announced. “Just in case. Now go, we only have so much time.”

Dom was starting to think he was in way, way over his head, but it wasn’t like Elijah could just walk out of the building wearing a lab coat and an AXIS company ID badge, could he? Elijah didn’t understand the ways of the world, he was just playing again, and Dom watched him walk away down the hallway a bit sadly, disappointed that this visit had been over so soon.

He wasn’t sure why he waited. Maybe out of some sort of demented hope that he’d see Elijah one last time, before the security guards dragged him back inside, or maybe because he didn’t feel like going back to work just yet. But wait he did, muttering to himself the whole time about how stupid this was, and how he should get going, because if they caught Elijah with Dom’s ID badge there could be trouble.

He was still muttering when a young, clean-cut man in an AXIS uniform strolled out and met him on the corner.

“Right,” Elijah announced. “Now we need to make haste, as they say. You do have a vehicle, right?”

Dom gaped at him. “I can’t take you with me,” he protested. “Do you have any idea how much trouble I’ll be in if they catch me stealing you? They know I was there, the receptionist checked my badge, I had to be scanned in by security personnel on every level…”

“Relax,” Elijah soothed, eyes scanning the pavement behind him. “I’ve covered for you as much as I could, and if they do catch up with us I’ll just tell them I coerced you. They know what I’m like, you won’t be prosecuted.”

“You _are_ coercing me,” Dom insisted with a rising sense of panic, but Elijah’s gaze suddenly snapped back to him, intelligent and determined.

“Yes or no, do you have a hovercraft? I’ll only tell them I coerced you if you help me get away. If you don’t, I’ll tell them you kidnapped me to sell to a foreign intelligence service. Think fast, what’s it going to be?”

Dom stood silent for a full three seconds before panic plunged into shock plunged into resignation. “Get in the hovercraft,” he ordered, and Elijah’s expression turned to glee as he climbed in after Dom and the pressure-seal slowly hissed shut.

“How did you get that uniform?” Dom asked as he eased into sky traffic, shifting over as many lanes as possible with the hope of getting lost in the flow.

He glanced at the passenger’s seat and saw Elijah smirk. “What do you think was in the package?” he asked smugly. “As soon as I saw you the first time, I figured it out. No one else but security personnel and lab workers move freely in and out. Them and you.”

“But how did you know I’d be the one to come?” Dom asked, frowning. Elijah had both hands pressed against the glass canopy and was staring out in wonder at the world, eyes tracking hovercrafts and buildings alike, probably recording everything about his daring escape to a memory chip for posterity.

“The number of security clearances you must have had to receive made it unlikely, statistically speaking, that both companies would go to the same trouble again when they already had you cleared,” Elijah informed him almost absently, half-leaning over Dom as he tried to see a silver schooner passing beneath them. “What’s that?”

“A schooner,” Dom answered shortly. “They’re going to get you back, you know. There’s no way they don’t have security cameras all over the place in that building, and my being there and then disappearing with you is a little too much of a coincidence, don’t you think?”

“Yes, well I would have had you tell Mrs. Beales that Mr. Wood had picked up his package, but then she would have been back at that desk and not keeping Liv busy, and I needed the extra time,” Elijah explained. “Stop!”

Dom braked automatically, and the hovercraft swung, eliciting an immediate chorus of protesting beeps and whistles from the rest of the hastily-braking traffic in his lane. “What?” he asked, wild-eyed and panicking. “What is it?”

“There,” Elijah answered, out of his seat and kneeling on the cushion now, pointing emphatically downwards. “I want to go there. For lunch.”

“You _eat_?” Dom exclaimed, his heart hammering from the moment of terror as he tried to get them on a course that would set them down at the restaurant Elijah was indicating. The digi-scan on his hovercraft informed him that it was a Burger Buster. An interesting choice for a first meal in the world, but Dom wouldn’t argue the point. Elijah was clearly the one calling the shots here.

“I analyze,” Elijah replied, hopping out of the hovercraft as soon as Dom had parked and initiated the time-pay. “It makes me a useful poison-tester. One of the technicians let me do it once, with a…fry? But Liv said it was futile and possibly damaging, and they never let me do it again. Can we get fries?”

“Yes,” Dom answered, feeling more bemused than ever. He started to order and then was cut off when Elijah stepped forward and engaged the baffled, bored-looking service clerk in enthusiastic conversation, which resulted in an order of nearly everything on the menu.

“I want to try things,” Elijah explained, eyes gleaming with what looked to Dom like more than just complex cyber-optics. “I want to try everything.”

Dom paid with a wince and helped Elijah to carry all of the bags to the hovercraft when their order came up. “This place is cheap, but you realize we can’t do this at every meal,” he pointed out. “I don’t get paid that kind of money.”

Elijah shrugged. “Don’t worry,” he reassured. “In two days there will be a reward offered for my capture and safe return, and you can collect on it. We’ll make up a story, they’ll never be able to prove anything. They’ll probably just be relieved to get me back.”

Dom realized he had stopped only when Elijah paused several feet ahead of him and looked back in puzzlement. “You’re going back?” Dom asked in shock. “I thought…you went through all of this to get away, how can you be willing to turn yourself in?”

Elijah shrugged again. “They’re going to catch me,” he said philosophically. “It’s only a matter of time. I might as well end it on my own terms, without you getting into trouble.”

Dom mulled that over in silence as they got back into the hovercraft and he pulled back into sky traffic. He didn’t know where else to take Elijah, so he just headed home, and punched in the code on his hovercraft to tell the AXIS computer he was done with deliveries for the day.

They continued for a while in silence, Dom thinking and Elijah analyzing, which seemed to consist of putting bites of food in his mouth, pausing, and then taking them back out again and carefully re-wrapping them in their grease-stained papers.

“You realize they’ll never let you out again,” Dom said finally, quiet. “They’ll lock you up and you may never even be allowed out again, once they know you’re capable of escaping.”

“I know,” Elijah answered simply. There didn’t seem to be any more to say, so Dom simply parked his hovercraft at his building, and escorted Elijah up the stairs to his room, carrying the bags for their lunch.

Dom dropped the bags on the table and turned around to face Elijah, who was leaning back against the door as it clicked shut with another somewhat-terrifying ‘I want to experience’ gleam in his eyes. Dom’s stomach lurched a little.

“Now,” Elijah announced gleefully. “Let’s have sex.”


End file.
